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Friday, May 03, 2013

One of my life's passions has always been writing. One of my long-time dreams is to be a published writer -- be it my poems or my stories (provided I ever actually FINISH one!! -_-) and have people actually LIKE what I write. One of the reasons I created this blog was to have it be my Writing blog, not just my Pagan blog.

I would LOVE to have a writing desk like this!

Unfortunately, I don't do very much writing nowadays, not even in this blog to write about the Pagan things going on in my life. This is one of those areas where I severely lack discipline and I, truthfully, psyche myself out too much. It's a bad habit that I need to cut out. Actually, I have a LOT of bad habits that I need to knock off.

1: The biggest one is how wastefully I often spend my time. I do too many things that are worthless distractions. I play too many Facebook games. The fact that I've cut down doesn't matter. My time still get swallowed in by Candy Crush Saga. Hell, if they allowed more lives than just 5, I'd have a bigger struggle. The fact that I allow myself to get drawn in by such time-wasters is something that has massively gotten in my way as a writer but it has also caused me a lot of hurt as a college student.

2: I don't spend enough time practicing. I've got writing textbooks still from my English Composition class and my Creative Writing class that I'd started the Spring Semester of last year that I'd ended up having to drop. There are SO MANY things I could use from those books in regards to writing exercises, writing prompts, etc. I've been told by many that I'm a good writer, but I know that there are A LOT of areas that I need to improve in order to be not just a GOOD writer, but a MARKETABLE writer.

3: I need to find something to write about every day, even if it's just a blurb. I'm not talking some stupid status on Facebook or Twitter. At one point, I used to write every day quite faithfully in my LiveJournal. That's a habit that I pretty much drastically dropped out of back in 2006 after some REALLY bad things began happening in my life. I just didn't have the energy to write anymore. Before then, I was writing poems fairly regularly. I was involved on a poetry site called TheStarliteCafe and I was taking part in poetry writing challenges quite frequently. But when things started going to complete and dire shite in 2006, my passion and zest pretty much died. If I were Greek, I guess you could say I'd lost my kefi.

I want so much get that fire and passion back, but I feel so lost more often than not. You ever feel like you're in a coma and you don't know how to wake up? It's like that. I WANT to write. I've got one story that I've had in the works for the past 2 years. I WANT to finish it. I WANT to actually be able to say that I've finished the writing of a novel I've started. And I WANT to be able to market it to publishing hopefuls.

And, really, I know I can do it. I just have to DO it. I have to stop psyching myself out. I have to stop giving in to all the internal reasons I have as to why I can't, because even I know that they're bullshit.

OMG I want so badly to have that amazing ALIVE feeling one gets when they have a story swimming around in their head that just will NOT shut up until it gets written! Hell, when I first had the idea for my Dragon story, I had goosebumps! I'm not even kidding! If I can write it well enough, it just might be a story I can sell and have it be successful!

So, here's what I want to do:

Sylvia Plath -- My most favorite poetess

1: Limit myself to ONE HOUR of Facebook every day. One hour AT MOST, and that includes any games.

2: Learn to re-direct myself to more constructive pursuits (be it writing or homework or whatever else) when I feel the itch to just be a lazy person and spend my time on stupid, needless sites.

3: I want to start doing writing exercises. Until I push myself into better habits, perhaps it's too much to say I want to do one writing exercise per day, but I won't know til I give it a try.

What you said about not having the energy to write after whatever crap hit the fan in 2006 really hit me.

That is how I feel now. The last 3 years have been a total soul suck, and as much as I want to write, and have ideas to write about...I feel like writing is akin to running up and down 20 flights of stairs with a 100 pound bag on my shoulders.

People assume *wrongly* that to be a writer all you need to do is park your arse down at a computer and start hitting keys. Real writers know that is bullshit. It takes a LOT of energy to write...and having to use mental energy to create is SO much harder than running up and down those stairs in my opinion.

@Bella Up until now, it never really occurred to me that anyone would truly understand how this feels and it is so refreshing and comforting to know that! Up until now, I always thought that I'm just merely lazy. I've got friends who are published writers and I feel a little helpless on the sidelines wondering what is wrong with me?

I'm so sorry you've been going through rough times too :-( I definitely know what you mean when you describe them as being soul-sucking. Your description of running up 20 flights of stairs with the 100lb bag on your shoulders was definitely the most apt description I've ever heard where it comes to the WANTING to write but not having the energy to write.

It is astounding the amount of mental energy it takes to write, even when it's as something as simple as a blog post. Depression is so much more debilitating than people tend to give it credit for and then when you're dealing with so many shitty situations on top of it, it feels so much like one big pile of defeat that I don't even know how to climb.